We Demand A Recount!: Electoral fraud in the USA

The overriding theme for 2016 in America was electoral fraud. We must take this seriously and ensure it didn’t happen on November 8. We need a recount.

The DNC was hacked by Russia this summer. This wasn’t the first time the USA had been cyber-attacked by a foreign power: North Korea crushed Sony less than two years ago. And who hasn’t had a virus on their computer or phone? As technology becomes more powerful, it also becomes more vulnerable.

The GOP went into overdrive to ensure that only verified eligible citizens would vote, and that each vote should be counted only once. While DEMs argued that voter ID laws would backfire and cause voter suppression, the Supreme Court and other legislative bodies countered that electoral security was more important than voter liberty for the country.

Nonetheless, Donald Trump cried with passion and authority that the election was rigged. He went further: he denounced the Electoral College as bogus and pollsters corrupt. He doubted whether he and his supporters could accept the final result.

Today the United States is in turmoil over an election that does, indeed, seem to have been corrupted. Are we meant to accept Trump’s electoral victory — a massive upset, completely unforeseen in the polls — as a sign of stability and security?

Within hours of the final electoral tally, astute civilian observers noted that more votes had been counted than people had voted in some Wisconsin and Michigan counties. That is, if 25,000 voters had cast votes, over 26,000 votes were counted. Furthermore, this double counting — a practice the GOP has spent hundreds of millions of taxpayer’s dollars ostensibly to prevent — appeared to favor Republican candidates, most especially Trump.

A second look at Pennsylvania’s completely electronic system shows that there were grave security issues with the machines. They could definitely have been hacked — and almost certainly were.

The hand-counted ballots in Western states give Hillary Clinton about a 2.5-million vote lead over Donald Trump, or about a 2% margin of the popular vote. That so few states would give her such a comfortable popular lead makes little statistical sense.

What seems plausible is that swing states such as Florida, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin were victims of dramatic and coordinated electorate fraud, on such a scale as to make the terrorist attacks of Sept 11, 2001 look like a game of Tic-Tac-Toe. While electoral fraud is certainly less immediately violent and horrifying than 9/11’s destruction, the long-term implications for America are much more grave.

If US elections are not safe, the entire foundation of our great nation is in jeopardy.

And yet, our most powerful politicians and media seem to be twiddling their thumbs and whistling happy tunes, looking the other way as the country crumbles.

Only Green Party leader Jill Stein has had the courage to demand a recount. The Democrats have been almost completely silent on the matter. Meanwhile Trump, in between Twitter rants, tried to legally halt Stein from simply auditing the election that he himself called into question. The hypocrisy is staggering.

Media pundits have given concerned citizens figurative eye-rolls while admonishing them to shut up and accept the verdict. That to question the validity of the election upturns the roots of democracy. So Americans should instead behave as if living in a dictatorship…?

Thankfully, a random collection of rag-tag part-timers have done some Pulitzer-worthy investigative journalism, uncovering enough egregious anomalies to warrant serious attention from major network news, as well as the US Department of Justice and the NSA. Yet these valiant efforts, powered mainly by social media, have been met with little more than a skeptical shrug.

One of the most frequent challenges raised against a recount is the cost involved. At approximately $2 million per state, we’re looking at up to $100 million dollars to properly audit the election. Yes, it is a sizeable sum for most individuals, but it’s really just a drop in the ocean when we consider the cost of running government.

Taxpayers are footing a $1 million per day (or $365 million per year) to pay for Melania and Baron Trump to hang out in New York while The Donald chats with Taiwan from the White House. So confirming the electoral count could actually be cost-cutting exercise.

We should audit elections as a matter of course, not a “radical act”. Today’s world is extremely complex and mistakes can easily happen. This is why we double, triple, and quadruple-check passengers before they get onto an airplane: we need to be assured dangerous entities haven’t slipped through the cracks.

Democracy is fragile. We must protect it as a matter of national honor. Holding a national recount is the patriotic thing to do.